A defining characteristic of our Secular-Left-Liberal academics is their incredible felicity to theorise reality. This theory is then injected into public discourse by their handmaidens in the media. As a consequence, we now have an entire generation of academics who sit in the lawns and lounges of India International Centre and spout out the “real” reason for say, the Muzaffarnagar riots and reel off reams of “analyses.” Equally, we have an entire generation of journalists whose faculties rebel against even the notion of stepping out their TV studios. And inRead More

What a way to fall when you’re 86 years old! And yet, as most who had observed the run up to the fall knew, it was only imminent. What primarily led to LK Advani’s graceless exit was a combination of incurable self-delusion and an obstinate refusal to acknowledge his irrelevance especially after the washout in 2009. It appeared as if he had become akin to a compulsive gambler who HAS to win at any cost–no matter how many people he hurt in the quest. Except that in his case, theRead More

He came, he saw, he spoke, and he wowed. He’d already conquered Bangalore years ago. In his 28 April election speech on the eve of the Karnataka Assembly polls 2013, Narendra Modi simply notched up yet another triumph in a long series of triumphs that began with his third consecutive, definitive victory in the Gujarat Assembly polls. Nobody expected anything less. Just as Narendra Modi the Chief Minister delivers every single time, Narendra Modi, the committed BJP party worker (as he describes himself) too delivers every single time. Consistency inRead More

The one word that comes to mind each time the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty’s name is taken is betrayal. Betrayal of trust, decency, hope, values, and the ultimate betrayal of the nation itself. And like with most betrayals after Independence, the tone for this betrayal too, was set by Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru. Perhaps the most decisive mandate was given to him on a platter by Gandhi who handed him the Indian Prime Ministership by favouring him over Sardar Patel. And as history is witness, Nehru squandered this massive opportunity to show hisRead More

The most important thing before we begin is to call things by their proper name. One, our clever-by-half media and secularati have twisted the retraction of Wharton School India Economic Forum’s invitation to Narendra Modi as a “snub.” Two, it was Wharton that had invited Modi. Modi hadn’t sought it out. Two pithy and succinct commentaries nicely sum up this shameful incident. The first is a tweet by Rajiv Malhotra: “Wharton snub of Modi is meddling in Indian democracy. Like Oxford training East India Co. officers. Except now Indian sepoysRead More

Consider these headlines: Mob attacks Gujarat train, toll 57 (Times of India) godhra: in a ghastly incident, at least 57 persons were burnt alive and many injured when the ahmedabad-bound sabarmati express was stoned and set on fire by a mob at godhra junction on wednesday morning. the dead comprised 17 men, 25 women and 14 children, most of whom were in the s-6 coach which was charred as the mob put petrol cans to deadly use. at least 36 persons were taken to the godhra civil hospital with burnsRead More

This is a guest post by Dr. Gautam Sen, who formerly taught at the London School of Economics. Dr. Sen is also an avid social and political commentator. He also puts to rest a new dangerous line being advocated by a few, which goes variously as the “aspirational Muslim” and so on. If India ever implodes in self-destruction, which seems all too likely with its wobbly political fortunes, its epitaph must surely be ‘hurt feelings of the aspiring mediocre’. Along with the rise of its kaleidoscopic caste politics, insane motoringRead More

Do you know who Rohit Pradhan is? Neither do I. But apparently Outlook thought it fit to carry this nonentity’s sorry excuse of an article against Narendra Modi, a poor imitation of Salil Tripathi’s eminently venomous piece in Mint last year. We’ll get to that later but first we need to strip the first five paragraphs of Rohit Pradhan’s 1017-word long textual bile to unmask what it really is: naked communalism. While we’re at those first five paragraphs, check out these gems: Lionized by a deviously clever PR machine andRead More

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Gross generalizations about a country, a people, and a culture are humourous when done in the lighter vein. In most other cases, they are appalling. If you wonder why Westerners/foreigners are so ill-educated about India, articles like this is the

Ananda Coomaraswamy is one of the little-known figures of India. Which is baffling because a vague estimate of his works runs into more than 15000 pages. It is all the more baffling because his range of subjects is almost beyond

Read Parts 1 and 2 I condemned the study-Hinduism-sympathetically plea in my previous post on this subject. This is akin, in my view, to appeasement, begging. Instead of asking people to study it, it is the responsibility of every thinking

Read Field Notes 1 on Ellora for a backgrounder. The Ajanta Caves The well-known story of how John Smith, a British officer belonging to the Madras army regiment, (re)discovered Ajanta caves doesn’t bear repitition. However, it suffices to say that

Swapan Dasgupta, a writer I’ve admired for long writes in the Wall Street Journal about the BJP’s chance of making a fresh start under Nitin Gadkari. It’s really an OK piece compared to Swapan’s more incisive articles. No new insight

Head over to this great piece by Mukta Raut. …I have observed that of all the religious communities, Hindus are the most clueless about their religion. I went to a convent school. We had a Moral Science period where the

This part continues examining Offstumped’s post on drawing a line. After mistakenly equating Dharma/Rajadharma with the present day Indian Constitution, he talks about Hindu interests. It is ironic that those who claim to protect Hindu interests have done little to

The elections are over but the secular crowd never seems to tire of slamming Gujarat. This time, a social scientist of sorts holds the baton. He tries to prove that the Gujarat Freedom of Religion Act, 2003 is dangerous. His

The old suspect, A.K. Ramanujan emerges out of the woodwork on Outlook’s pages. The magazine’s leader to this article says: …in a pocket of the Delhi University, right-wing student activists have taken exception to this essay by the celebrated scholar

I’m currently reading an interesting book (will post a review at a later date) which gives an interesting tidbit about the Indian system of Logic. The system that comes closest to the Western model of analytical philosophy is called Nyaya.

So this is both a question and a test of how well you know your Hinduism. 🙂 What according to Sanatana Dharma is the root cause of religious fundamentalism/bigotry? Technorati Tags: hinduism,sanatana dharma,question,quiz,india,indian philosophy